It’s not often the lights end a tennis match early, but that’s what happened during Waynesburg’s match against Thiel Tuesday, where the Jackets lost, 5-2 .

The final two matches were called early for Thiel’s, Taylor Ranegar and Reagan Hayne. It was a lost opportunity for the Jackets who had to end two sets early because of lighting issues. Head coach Ron Headlee remembers a similar occurrence last season when the team also had to end early because there wasn’t any more daylight.

“We were almost playing in the dark last year.” Headlee said. “With three courts I [didn’t] think we are going to get finished. We didn’t.”

Headlee had two freshmen in his top six for singles and thought  both played well. Hayley Sweeny’s Sweeney’s night was cut in the second set at 3-2 because there of the daylight issue.

Last year when the two teams matched up, Headlee thought there was a chance they wouldn’t be able to complete the meet., This year, those fears were realized. 

“We ran out of daylight, we only had three courts we could use,” Headlee said.

Overall, Headlee thought his team put too much pressure on itself  to win this match up in hopes of getting the first conference win of the year.

“I thought we were a little tight yesterday, pressing a little,” he said.  “[We] knew [we had] a chance to win. We lost to them last year 5-4 and I thought we were pressing a little bit and weren’t playing relaxed.”

In a pivotal back and forth in the third singles, Thiel’s Angela Campbell beat Noelle Hughes, 6-1, 4-6 and 10-8 to give Thiel the 3-2 lead which Waynesburg didn’t have a real chance to  come back from.

Headlee thought Campbell was better than Thiel’s one and two singles players.

Although the Jackets fell to 1-2 on the season, Headlee is hopeful the team will have strong performances as the season continues, starting with a non-conference match against Mt. Aloysius Friday at 4:30.

“Mount Aloysius beat us last year but I think we’ll be competitive with them,”  Headlee said. “I think we can be competitive these next five matches.”